Lemon Balm - Cultivation and Medicinal Uses

Lemon balm is a delightful garden herb that smells like lemon and looks like peppermint.

It makes sense that if you're going to be using a new type of medicine, and lemon balm IS a herbal medicine, you should research it thoroughly and if it is within your ability, consult a herbal practitioner or naturalist.

If you're going ahead with this on your own please start slowly. You never know if you might be allergic to something. Take only a small amount at first and work up to a full dose. If you feel this herb is making you sick, discontinue the treatment immediately. Consult a medical doctor if you have any concerns at all about what you're doing.

The following list of the uses of lemon balm has been derived from a variety of herb information resources. I cannot take responsibility to assure that lemon balm will help your condition, or that you cannot be harmed by it. I do not diagnose, nor do I recommend specific treatments for you.

I will say that lemon balm grows in my garden and I have used it successfully internally and externally without ill effect for several conditions over the course of about ten years.

If you want professional advice on your medical conditions and the use of herbs, consult a naturopathic physician and/or your family doctor. I am not a doctor; I'm just a herb using woman that grows herbs in her garden for personal use, who has studied herbs over the course of about thirty-five years. I share with you what I've learned from other herbalists (or discovered from my own use of herbs) but don't do any scientific testing. This is folk medicine!

"It seems to be a favorite of bees and should be grown in home gardens to attract bees for the healthy fertilization of your plants. In earlier times melissa tea was drunk to make the mind and heart merry, to revive the heart, to help people who sleep too much, and to drive out cares and melancholy."

-- Jeanne Rose, in Herbs and Things

Lemon balm can easily be started from seed, or you can start lemon balm from cuttings.

Cuttings: Take a cutting in the fall and let it sit on your sunny windowsill in a cup of water until springtime, then plant it.

Seeds: These plants are amazingly easy to grow. Sow in late spring. When seedlings are three inches high, transplant 18 inches apart. Lemon balm creates a nice bush about 12-24 inches around. It doesn't spread rapidly like peppermint does.

Division: Dig up part of your lemon balm plant and transplant to another part of your garden. It should take off nicely so long as there are plenty of roots.

Harvest lemon balm when you first notice it is getting ready to flower. You can cut it down all the way to the ground and it will grow back. You may be able to get two or three harvests per summer.

If you have a need for lemon balm for cooking or medicine, you can clip a bit of new growth from the end of a branch and use it fresh anytime, though during winter you can expect it to wither and go dormant.

To dry, clip the branches and bundle about ten of them together. You can tie a bit of twine or string around the ends and hang them upside down in a room in your house, in a tent or shed, or inside paper bags. The paper bags keep insects off the drying plants. The paper bags can be hung on your clothes line outside or in a shed.

"Herbal medicine, either using whole plants or isolated plant principles, is called phytotherapy. It presents itself as a gift of nature, with a cosmic naturalness that makes it the obvious choice for a first-treatment approach. Generations have made use of it, gained experience, and cherished it, like a historical treasure, as a source for therapy."

-- Professor H.E. Bock, quoted in Herbal Medicine